大象传媒

Chapter 2

Inevitably our turn came. If I remember right the sirens went about eight o'clock, we didn't rush to the garden shelter immediately, as previously indicated our family was somewhat laid back, when the first bomb fell we soon moved house. After that the bombs seemed to fall fairly thick and heavy. Of course I knew that one would not land on us! In any case during a lull in the bombing we were assured by our local Irish Air Raid Warden Mr Luscum, in a broad Irish accent, 鈥淪hure stay in there and you'll be as safe as houses!鈥� Rich considering the houses were being blown up like packs of cards. Certainly Mrs Steel who shared the shelter with us, did not share his optimism. Mrs Steel was firmly convinced that we should surrender and kept saying so. That was between praying, Mrs Steel was an ex convent girl and very religious at that moment in time. However, we made allowances for Mrs Steel, after all Mrs Steel was half Italian! All Italians had been cowards since time immortal. I don't know how that equated with the Roman legions. Again the confidence of youth, I knew we were safe, I never expected one of the bombs to land directly on top of us and we had been assured by no less than the Ministry of Defence, that in our Anderson shelters, we were quite safe from anything except a direct hit. My confidence waned about three o'clock in the morning. There was another lull in the bombing, when we heard it "Swish, Swish, Swish!" 鈥淥h my God it's a Land Mine!鈥� my father said. It was a good job I didn't suffer from weak bowels. I don't know how Mrs Steel went on. The "Swish, Swish, Swish" was followed by "Crunch, Crunch, Crunch." We just sat terrified waiting for it to explode. That was the longest two minutes of my life. Land mines were purported to flatten half a square mile. Nothing happened. My father ventured out but could not see anything. Later on it was surmised that it must have been a loose barrage balloon cable dragging, I will never know but that is one experience I should not like to repeat!

Our turn did come, I didn't hear the bomb arriving but there was a terrific explosion, a large bomb had landed slap in the middle of our street! Debris showered down.

Eventually the all clear sounded, our roof had a large hole in it, there was rubble on the bed and there was a line of upturned earth right across ours and next doors garden. Had that crunching noise been a bomb burying it's way in? The area was checked but nothing was found.

In the centre of the street there was a crater about twenty feet deep we were told it was an aerial torpedo bomb that had landed, the fact that it had gone so deep, before exploding had limited the damage. Ten houses were completely destroyed. Our house was only three doors away from the edge of the crater, digging was going on for the survivors. Jerry had created the local children's adventure playground of the future. The families in the houses were O. K. saved by their garden shelters and reinforced cellars.

We later had great fun playing in the bombed out houses, going up and down rickety staircases and venturing down into cellars. People were not as safety conscious in those days, we children had much more lee way.

We were told by the Wardens we would have to move out immediately. There were six unexploded bombs in the area including a land mine in one of the gardens on the opposite side of the street. Was that the Swish, Swish, Swish that we had heard? All the families where told to congregate in the local church hall on Brunswick St., meals and bedding were to be provided. It would have been difficult to stay in any case. The rooms were covered in soot, from the impromptu sweeping of the chimneys and all the windows at the front of the house had been blown out, there were large holes in the roof. We had to leave out four budgerigars behind since they were in a large breeding cage.

I found out later that one of the unexploded bombs was residing in the basement of my pal Sydney's house, on Broomspring Lane. Apparently the bomb went straight through the roof, the attic bedroom, the next bedroom and the living room below and finished up in a wash tub in the cellar, I assume it must have been a small 500 pound bomb. Later the family moved nearer to us. That house was what was termed a three up and down house. Living kitchen, bedroom and attic above. Attic bedrooms, hot in summer, freezing in winter. To go to the toilet, they went four houses down, up a passageway between the houses and across a yard to where the toilets were in a block. In some respects Hitler was doing us a favour when he blew up some of the houses.

From here on my war took a bit of a swing down hill, I enjoyed sleeping on the floor at the Church hall, having home teaching at a parent's house, because of damage to the school and only going half a day. Although the teacher was a bit too near across the dining room table but my parents had to go and spoil it all by arranging to move in with our posh relatives at Ecclesall. My Grandmother on my Father's side and his two sisters, plus Vi鈥檚 friend Freda, who also lived there and Aunt Grace鈥檚 friend, Gladys who lived two doors up. All four of them were school teaches! Maths, English and Physical Training and Music. My Aunt Vi .the Physical Trainer was a strict disciplinarian since Aunt Grace was an English teacher, I was expected to talk proper and go to bed at half past eight and then there was such a thing as table manners!

Christmas was spent at my Grandmas and Aunts鈥� home. I settled into a new routine, it had it's advantages, I slept in a reinforced cellar and did not have to get up for any air raid warnings, the novelty of being awoken at night had worn off. There was no school at all at this stage. My father made a trip back to our old home to feed the budgerigars which we had to leave behind. He dodged the police on duty at the barricades with the "DANGER UNEXPLODED BOMBS!" signs, by going over the back garden walls. The budgerigars were normally very timid but they where so hungry, they fed out of my father's hand. Eventually the area was declared safe and he was able to enter without holding his breath.

Life near to the country was great as far as sledging was concerned, steep grass slopes and winters that provided plenty of snow. We returned to our house in the Summer. There were two final incidents of note. One evening we were suddenly disturbed by the scream of a falling bomb, no warning whatsoever. Whilst we held our breath the noise increased to a crescendo. It seemed to pass right over the top of our house and then there was an almighty explosion. The bomb just missed Crookesmoor dam half a mile away, by about twenty feet, this was followed by the warning wailing of the air raid sirens; a sound which turned your stomach over at the best of times, better late than never? The pilot was either unloading a spare bomb or had made a brilliant attempt at breaching the dam, although it was not a very large dam.

Our next little fright was the "Doodle Bugs." Germany had been raining these pilotless flying bombs on London for some time. We thought we were fairly safe. The racket they make was surprising, the noise woke up my eighteen month old brother, who was still sleeping downstairs; he was quite happy about it. We were not so unconcerned, while we waited to see if the engine would cut. You were O.K. while it was going, when it stopped, they just fell out of the sky, you hoped you would not be underneath, fortunately this one carried on going and exploded in the hills somewhere past Crookes. Well that was that for me, the end of the active part of the war.
There were parties in the street on V. E. day - victory in Europe and V. J. day - victory over Japan. Horrific news reels of the German concentration camps. How could one human treat another in this way?
Prior to V.E. I saw the planes on the thousand bomber raids. I remember standing in the school yard in the afternoon at play time, the air was filled with bombers high up in the sky as far as the eye could see. So the grief was not all one sided. It would never be the same again, there would never be that comradeship that existed then but I am so glad that I was only seven years old when it all started.

FINITO!

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